Preparation and characterization of layered zirconium phosphates based on water-in-oil microemulsion

Layered zirconium phosphates[Zr(HPO4)(2) center dot H2O, (H3O) Zr-+(2)(PO4)(3) and Zr(HPO4)(8) center dot H2O] were synthesized in water/oil(W/O) microemulsion system containing heptane, CTAB/butanol and water water. X-ray diffraction ( XRD) transmission electron microscopy ( TEM) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) were utilized to characterize the structure, morphology and size. It was found that the preparation of zirconium phosphate in W/O microemulsion could control structure based on the microemulsion composition ( i. e. three layered zirconium phosphates obtained with different ratio of water and oil) and morphology based on the reacted conditions ( i. e. the, size and morphology of. a-zirconium phosphate can be controlled with different reacted time and temperature in microemulsion). We believe that the simple synthetic method based on microemusion would benefit the controllable synthesis of zirconium phosphates greatly.